A Family That Plays Together.....

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Things To Do With Your Family

There is a very old saying, and that is "A family that plays together stays together", and that is so very true. Usually these types of sayings have some basis of truth.

The thing is, what is there to do that is going to really make a difference. What can you do as a family that is going to be memorable, or make a difference in the way they act, or behave or even feel about you or the family in the here and now?

Perhaps going to the zoo, or going camping will be something that they will remember, but sometimes these experiences aren't worth remembering. Sometimes those experiences are so full of mishaps that you and the kids would prefer not to remember what happened, for the weather was bad and you spent the whole two days in the tent, or everyone got poison oak over three quarters of their body. Sometimes even though the thought was there, the temperment of those involved wasn't so good and sometimes things just don't go as planned.

Of all the things that we did as kids, the times that I remembered most and best were the ones that we spent as home playing games. As I sat thinking about those times, I realized that it wasn't really what we did or where we went, it was just the fact that we were together, we were getting along and talking and laughing together, and having fun. We always made popcorn, or chips and dip, and no matter who won or lost, we did learn about sportsmanship, and we learned how to do the things that might seem boring to a lot of people, but it was time that we felt relaxed and comfortable enough, that if we did have something that we wanted to talk about, or had a problem we didn't know how to solve, we could sometime during this time, bring it up in a out of the way manner.

When we were young, it was Shoots and Ladders, a game that was nothing more than learning how to count, and a game that was really a matter of chance if you won or lost.

Candyland was also a very simple game that was aimed at a very young audience. It taught colors and shapes, taking turns, and again sportsmanship. It also taught your kids that you liked spending time doing the things that they liked.

Through elementary school there was an assortment of games that I can remember playing on game night, and a couple of them were Sorry, Parchisi, and Trouble. These were all games that were basically a matter of rolling dice, and racing around the board seeing who could get home first, or seeing who could get all of their men around the board and home first. Sometimes there were obstacles, or ways to get sent back to start over, but this was all in the fun of the game. Frustration and bad sportsmanship were both things that could be taught and worked on, and related to in the game and applied sometimes right into real life situations.

As we got older still games like Scrabble, Boggle, Uno, Bingo and Monopoly were played. These games were a little more complicated, and took a little bit more skill to play as well as quite a bit more time to play. These types of games worked on the skills like spelling, arithmetic, and also worked on the kids attentions spans, for sometimes a game of Monopoly took a few hours to play.

What I am actually talking about besides the obvious scholastic skills, are that these family game nights were times that gave us kids and the adults in our lives the time and a chance to communicate with one another. It gave us as a family a chance to fill in the generation gap for we had time to talk, us kids in our way discussing in our language and new words not familiar to our parents, and our adults to become comfortable with our language and familiar with the types of problems that we had that they probably did not have when they were our age, for the world was changing at quite a fast rate. It gave us time to communicate and that was the main thing that families don't have anymore.

So take the time to look at these games, old fashion as they may be, and have a family game night, for talking and laughing together as a family is an old fashioned thing of the past.

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AUTHOR

deb douglas

7 years agofrom Oxnard

Technology has changed our society and the way we interact (or don't) with each other so much, that I think that it is most of the problems we are having in our communities today. We have lost the days of having people over for dinners, sunday bar b ques and so on to the point where we do not even have the friends that we used to.

marellen

7 years ago

I still like playing those games and have friends over dinner and then we get out the games. Really fun times for sure.

Paradise7

7 years agofrom Upstate New York

Great hub. I could wish more families played games together instead of watching so much TV, getting stuck in front of the computer, or a video game.

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